


Inevitable as Tea

by teaandjumpers



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, First Time, M/M, Post Reichenbach, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-29
Updated: 2012-01-29
Packaged: 2017-10-30 06:51:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/328969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teaandjumpers/pseuds/teaandjumpers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-Reichenbach reunion sex with some fluff thrown in for good measure.</p><p> </p><p>  <i>And there he is. John. It's so simple. He opens his eyes and there he is. John. His John. If only it had been this easy over the past year, when he was lonely, or found himself talking to a lampshade, if only he could've shut his eyes and willed John to be there.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Inevitable as Tea

When John walks into the flat, Sherlock is waiting. He's been waiting over three hours now. John's new flat is on the outskirts of London, at the head of a street lined with second-rate pubs. It is considerably smaller than 221b and comparatively drab with it's beige living room and yellow kitchen. It looks nothing like a place someone as extraordinary as John Watson would live, should live, and Sherlock almost doubts his intel, but the cane propped in the corner of the living space, the Royal Medical Corps mug on the TV tray, and a batch of Mrs. Hudson's biscuits in the kitchen, quickly dissolve that line of reasoning.

The flat has no personality. No clutter. John has been living here for over a year, and there are no pictures up, no personal items, just things for everyday use. A modest TV. John's laptop. A thick blanket strewn over a well-worn couch. Second hand. The blanket indicates that John has been spending his nights on the couch, falling asleep to the sound of the television.

Sherlock was a little surprised to find that none of his things had made it to the flat. He knew that Mycroft had been paying for the rent, offering to pay for Sherlock's half if John wanted to move back to 221b, so his things were still unpacked, sitting in the flat as if he never left. It would have been easy for John to pick up the skull or Sherlock's violin, some type of keepsake. Sentiment.

He shook off his indignation. He knew how much John cared for him. The fact that John hadn't bothered to keep something of Sherlock's was probably indicative of how hard it was for John to be reminded of Sherlock.

He was restless. He used to think himself well-versed in all things John Watson, but John, _John_ , he always managed to surprise Sherlock just when he thought he had the man figured out. He had surprised Sherlock that first night when he shot the cabbie and stood behind the crime scene tape looking small and strong and altogether improbable. He did it with his steadfast faith in Sherlock, _you could_ , John had said, _you could be that clever_. He had to push those words out of his head when he was hunting down the rest of Moriarty's men. They were too much. But in those brief moment of respite, when he needed the world around him to just stop, he let those words, John's voice, curl around him.

A sharp jangle of keys and the sound of footstep shake Sherlock out of his reverie. He is sitting in the armchair, the one with the TV tray in front of it, and he has a perfect view of the door. He shuts his eyes. He can't look at John. It would be too much. The emotions on John's face. Sherlock had enough trouble processing them and he knows that the slew of hurt, hope, anger, love that would pass over John's face may very well leave Sherlock incapacitated. No. He will keep his eyes shut. Give John the chance to take in the information and then he would gather his data. Then he would seek forgiveness.

The door creaks as it opens. Lights go on. There's a sharp exhale coupled with the sound of keys falling to floor. There's an attempt to move feet, left shoe sliding an inch off the floor then settling, no, staggering back onto the hardwood.

John's breathing is ragged. He is exhaling through his nose sharply and clearly not getting enough air.

John's breathing. Sherlock missed the sound of his breathing.

"Sh- Sherlock?" says John. His voice is shaky. Sherlock hears a choked back sob and he can feel his eyes start to burn behind their closed lids.

He decides not to put it off any longer and opens his eyes.

And there he is. John. It's so simple. John. _His_ John. If only it had been this easy over the past year. When he was lonely, or found himself talking to a lampshade and not John, if only he could've shut his eyes and willed John to be there.

He has let his hair grow out. It curls out a little at the ends. He's stopped using gel to keep it down. He is wearing his black jacket, his favourite one, and an over-sized, knitted scarf. He recognizes the handiwork as Molly's. He is donning the jeans he always wears and his brown shoes. He looks remarkably unchanged, except--except for his eyes. His eyes look tired, wary, guarded. The openness that once drew everyone into the warmth of one John Watson is gone.

John is still standing at the door, one hand braced against its frame. Sherlock gets on his feet and approaches the other man. All of the scenarios he had rehearsed in his head where he explained his reasoning to John in a cool and calculated manner that would leave John no choice but to forgive him, to understand, flies out the door and Sherlock finds himself falling to his knees at John's feet, not daring to look up at the other man's face. He just sobs, "Sorry, sorry. I'm so sorry."

John immediately kneels and lays a hand on Sherlock's shoulder. He strokes the back of Sherlock's neck and wipes away his tears. John's own eyes are glassy, tears gathering at their base, but not yet spilling. He is smiling that warm smile of his, the one that is solely designated for Sherlock and one Sherlock has christened John's you-are-insufferable-but-amazing smile.

John wipes at Sherlock's face with the sleeves of his jacket. Sherlock wants to protest; John doesn't deserve to have his jacket sullied by Sherlock's tears, but before he can say anything, John pulls back his hand and presses a chaste kiss on Sherlock's lips. He holds his lips against Sherlock's for what seems like an eternity, not trying to take it any further and just breathing in deeply through his nose.

It triggers a shock through Sherlock that rolls up the length of his spine and he has to will his body to not start shaking.

When John pulls back, he grabs Sherlock by the shoulders and helps him up to his feet. He guides Sherlock to one end of the sofa and wraps a blanket around him, pulling the ends of the blanket around Sherlock's neck.

Sherlock lets John do this. He will let John do anything, he thinks, because he can see John now, can watch him, touch him, borrow his toothbrush, bury his nose in his hair, listen to him exhale, watch him pull off his jacket, one sleeve at a time, like he's doing now.

"I'll make the tea," John says as if it hasn't been a year since John has said those words to Sherlock.

He watches John make the tea and marvels at the man's patience. How could John go through the motions like that, pour the water, turn on the stove, set out the mugs, when Sherlock was there, brimming to the rim with an explanation for his disappearance. For his death.

John steeps the tea, plops two sugars into Sherlock's cup, and brings the cups over. Sherlock wraps both hands around his cup, not because he is cold, but because tea wasn't something he regularly indulged in when he was on the lam. Sherlock breathes in the aroma of the tea. He's glad to note that John has not switched tea brands and opted for something cheaper. Not because Sherlock has a preference, but tea was always something John allowed himself to indulge in and it gave Sherlock some comfort to know that John didn't lose that part of himself that had a long-standing affair with tea.

John sits on the sofa across from him. He brings up his legs onto the sofa and crosses them Indian style so that his posture mirrors Sherlock's. He doesn't sip at his tea, just cups it in his hands as he watches Sherlock. He looks expectant, but calm. Too calm.

Sherlock looks down at his tea and keeps his eyes fixed there as he begins to explain. He tells John what happened on the roof with Moriarty, how he had to convince everyone he was dead, how he enlisted Molly's help, how he tracked down each of Moriarty's men and women and made sure they were either locked up for good or never to be found. He told John how he didn't think of him often, because every time he did, he fell into a state of absolute despair that typically ended with him seeking comfort in something stronger than cigarettes. Except that wasn't entirely true, because he always thought of John. It was because of John he was out there and it was because of John that he persisted and didn't let himself be reckless as he would've been had he been in London with John.

He looks up at John at the end of his apology. Because that's what it was really, an apology. It was _sorry for leaving you, sorry for not taking you with me, sorry for worrying you, sorry for separating us._

To his credit, John continually surprises. He sets his mug down and says, "I understand," but that is all he says. He doesn't move, or smile, or drink his tea. He just sits there and watches Sherlock, his face open but his emotions unreadable.

Sherlock watches right back. They sit there and ignore their tea, the space between them, the sounds outside. They lock eyes and drink in one another. It isn't intense, it's simply an act of taking back what they had been deprived of for so long. It is making up for all the looks that have not been passed between them. The looks across their table at Angelo's, over bodies at the morgue, over Mycroft's condescending head, over the screens of their respective laptops.

Sherlock is the one to break eye-contact. He does it when he sets down his tea and pulls the blanket off of him, but his eyes shoot back to John's when he makes his way across the sofa and stops just short of John. He is sitting up on his knees, towering over John, but John doesn't look concerned. He looks expectant again, like he knows what's going to happen, and it's enough to make Sherlock want to yell out, "Oh, come now, John."

But he doesn't. Instead, he raises a hand to John's cheek and lowers his lips to John's.

John doesn't move and Sherlock can't tell if that's a good sign or bad, but he moves his lips against John's regardless, settling his hand at the base of John's neck and pulling the other man into the kiss.

Something in John's seems to break, because a sound that sounds like part pain and part pleasure, tears through him and he wrenches his fists into Sherlock's hair and leans up into him.

"Sherlock, you utter, fucking bastard," he hisses against Sherlock's lips.

Sherlock finds himself slipping back into his apologetic mode because he's whispering sorry again, over and over. It barely registers because John is nipping at his bottom lip, plunging his tongue into Sherlock's mouth, only breaking away to say, "Never. Never again, Sherlock. Never, never, never."

Sherlock can do nothing but nod.

 

They make their way up to John's bedroom, stopping every few steps to nip at each others lips and caress each others sides. When they reach the bedroom door, Sherlock pulls John against him so that Sherlock's front is pressed against John's back. He slides his hands down to John's hips and pulls John's arse against his growing erection. He has left John in the dark so many times that he wants John to know exactly what his intentions are. John does not disappoint. He bites his bottom lip, and god how Sherlock had missed that, and he fists a hand into Sherlock's hair.

John seems content to stay in that position, just outside his bedroom, rolling his hips back into Sherlock, but Sherlock has other plans.

In the room, they take their time taking off each others clothes. With each garment that slips off, they stop and examine the changes in the other man. John seems determined to run his hands across every inch of Sherlock as it's exposed. He lays both palms against Sherlock's chest and drags them down and across and to the side. He gets on his knees and lavishes a trail of kisses from Sherlock's navel to his collarbone. His kisses stop there and he presses his nose against Sherlock's skin and inhales.

Sherlock can't wait any longer and he tells John this. John nods into Sherlock's chest and walks backwards towards his bed, pulling Sherlock down with him.

John pulls out a tube of lube from his nightstand and grabs Sherlock's hand. He holds Sherlock's gaze as he coats two of Sherlock's fingers with a generous amount of lubricant. He then lies back and spreads his legs.

Sherlock may be inexperienced, but he knows what's being asked of him. He braces one hand near John's waist and brings the other hand, the one covered in lube, to John's entrance. He skims the hole with the pad of his thumb and is rewarded by a sharp hiss from John.

He presses into John, first with his index finger, then his middle finger. He scissors his fingers open, stretching the other man and setting up a steady rhythm that John follows with rolls of his hips. John has his head thrown back and his hands curled around the sheets.

"God," John says. "Your fingers. Do you know how many times I've thought about your fingers, about you doing this?"

Sherlock feels like he's high. Like he can do anything.

"What would you let me have, John?" he asks.

"You know," says John breathless. "You must know."

Sherlock has a pretty good idea, given their current position, but he pushes forward anyways. "Maybe, but I'd still like to hear you say it."

"Anything, Sherlock," says John. "Anything you ask for. Anything and everything."

That's all Sherlock wants to hear. He coats his cock with lubricant, applying it with two perfunctory strokes. He needs to be in John. To bury himself in the man. To occupy him so wholly that he is the only thought coursing through John's mind. He positions himself at John's entrance and eases into him. John is tight, so tight that the pressure around his cock almost hurts, and all Sherlock can think is I am in John Watson, I am actually inside John Watson. The feeling of being surrounded by that heat, by John's heat, is amazing and Sherlock accesses his mental hard drive to determine whether there's a way to permanently attach oneself to a person in this way. The results turn up negative.

"Hey," John says lifting his hand and running a thumb across Sherlock's mouth. "Come back to me."

Sherlock leans into the touch and lavishes John's thumb with an open mouthed kiss before pulling it into his mouth. This must be the right thing to do, because John clenches around him and Sherlock's own body, knowing exactly what to do, lurches forward of its own volition.

"Fuck, Sherlock," says John. The glassy look in his eyes is gone now. His pupils have gone near black. "Fuck me," he says and hooks his legs around Sherlock's torso.

Sherlock stills as John closes his eyes and curls his hands around the bed's headboard. John's voice adopts that gravelly tenor it gets when he's angry. "Go on," he says. "I can take it."

Sherlock is suddenly accosted by the thought of the other people who have been with John in this manner. He has a good idea of how many partner's John has had since Sherlock's departure. He decides that he will purge all traces and memories of John's past lovers by kissing, licking, biting, and coming all over every inch of John. He tells John this as he thrusts in and out of him and John groans appreciatively.

Sherlock also wants to run a magnifying glass over John, take skin samples, semen samples, and pictures for a visual map of his body. He doesn't tell John these things, but he likes to think that John would be okay with them.

John's legs are grappling to pull him closer and Sherlock acquiesces by pulling John's hands from the headboard and pinning them above his head. He presses his forehead against John's and rocks himself in and out of him. The friction is glorious. John closes around Sherlock as if he was made for him.

John is huffing out sharp breaths and his brow is tightly knitted. He looks beautiful.

Sherlock has never been this close to a living person. He has never had more than eight of his body parts flush against another, not even in fights. He has never shared the same air as someone else and not felt disgusted by it. He has never wanted to roll around in another person's sweat like he does John's.

He has to work harder to maintain a rhythm because John is coming, clenching his arse in a way that it makes it hard to pull out, but when John is spent and his muscles relax, Sherlock hooks the other man's legs over his shoulders and rides John until the heat becomes too much and orgasm hits him.

He eases out of John and watches his cum trickle out of John's hole. The sight gives him a sense of primal satisfaction. The word MINE sears across his mind.

"Are you done enjoying your handiwork," John asks from below him.

John looks like the epitome of a relaxed lover. He has his head perched against one arm and is smiling up at Sherlock like this isn't the first time they've had sex, or the first time they've seen each other completely naked.

Sherlock considers denying it, but doesn't. "My semen looks good on you."

John barks out a laugh. "Wow, Sherlock. Just wow. Don't ever work in the porn business, okay?"

And he's glad that this is still there too. Sherlock saying something honest and John telling him how ridiculous it sounds, because normal people just don't speak that way, and John tells him what normal people would say, but he smiles in that fond way of his that tells Sherlock that John doesn't really want Sherlock to say what normal people say.

"I'd like to take high-resolution photos of you and spread them out across my bedroom floor," says Sherlock.

John says nothing, but rolls his eyes. He lifts himself up off the bed, walks over to his dresser, and rummages through a drawer until he finds what he's looking for.

It's an HD camera. He tosses it to Sherlock, who catches it deftly.

John plops himself back onto the bed and says, "I'm all yours."


End file.
